Antoine Wilson's delightful Panorama City is a transcript of 10 tapes recorded over one long night in the hospital by Oppen Porter, a 28-year-old, 6'5" "slow absorber" who fears he won't live until morning, laying out for his unborn son an account of the last 40 days of his life.
When his father dies, Oppen buries him as he wished: in the yard, with his two hunting dogs. This provokes concern among the neighbors and the police. Rather than let Oppen live alone, his disciplinarian Aunt Liz summons him to her home in Los Angeles's San Fernando Valley, lining him up a job at a fast-food restaurant and sending him to the Lighthouse Christian Fellowship. But, as early as the bus ride to his new home, Oppen falls under the spell of Paul Renfro, an old philosopher who engages him in various unsuccessful schemes and ultimately moves into the crawl space above Aunt Liz's ceiling--without her knowing.
Wilson assembles a hugely likable cast in this oddball coming-of-age tale, starting with Oppen: a special but sheltered kid who's lived most of his life as the town joke. With very dry wit, a cockeyed tolerance for human foibles and a goofy idealism, Oppen painstakingly records his journey, helped along the way by bus drivers, a pretty police officer, a collector of abandoned shopping carts and Carmen, the Mexican prostitute who's carrying his child. Long before the last tape begins, readers will have grown to love Wilson's earnest, well-meaning protagonist, who just wants to learn what it means to be a man of the world. --Nick DiMartino, Nick's Picks, University Book Store, Seattle